Various forms of storage systems are used today. These forms include direct attached storage (DAS) network attached storage (NAS) systems, storage area networks (SANs), and others. Network storage systems are commonly used for a variety of purposes, such as providing multiple users with access to shared data, backing up data and others.
A storage system typically includes at least one computing system executing a storage operating system for storing and retrieving data on behalf of one or more client computing systems (“clients”). The storage operating system stores and manages shared data containers in a set of mass storage devices.
Networked storage systems are used extensively in NAS, SAN and virtual environments. The infrastructure for such storage systems uses various components/resources, for example, switches, storage devices and others. Continuous efforts are being made to efficiently manage the resources that are used in networked storage systems.